“Want to hear something funny?” I asked innocently as I reached into the cooler to grab an ice cold Snapple.

“I have been waiting patiently for you to say something humorous for the past several months, my friend,” The Devil said dryly as he looked at me over his newspaper.

I glared across the couch, cursed him in my thoughts, and then took a sip of my drink.

“Do you want to hear this or not?” I impatiently asked my impeccably dressed guest, who had taken off his suit jacket and rolled up his shirt sleeves to deal with the August heat.

How he ever survived every day in a three-piece suit in Hell was beyond me.

“Please, Austin, share your witty anecdote with me and fill my afternoon with laughter,” Lucifer replied mockingly as he put down the paper.

Okay. Tough crowd.

“I got two emails from blog readers this week asking why, given my recent hard core running program, I’d yet to write a Sundays With Satan Short Story entitled ‘Running With The Devil’,” I submitted for his consideration.

The Prince of Darkness stared at me stone faced like a Gargoyle. “Were those readers David Lee Roth and Eddie Van Halen? I doubt it, of course, seeing as how I doubt either of them is literate, let alone an avid fan of blogs.”

I looked at him in confusion. “Why the hatred for Van Halen, dude?”

“Let’s just say that I used to be pretty tight with those guys,” he grumbled. “Close enough for them to write a song about our time together, and yet they have never given me any credit for their success. Not even a shout out at an awards ceremony or a mention in an interview. Screw them. I’d say they could go to Hell, but they are not welcome there!”

Whoa. That was most unexpected. Satan got up in a huff, snatched his pitchfork out of the corner, and began to do frightening Darth Maul type maneuvers with it.

“Look, I didn’t mean to touch a nerve,” I said apologetically.

I even held out a Snapple as a peace offering, but he wanted absolutely nothing to do with it. He just kept rapidly twirling his pitchfork like he planned to wipe out the last of the Jedi Knights with it.

After another tense minute of this behavior, The Devil stood still. The tapped his pitchfork once against the living room floor, and then returned it to the corner.

Next, he adjusted his silk tie and strode quietly back to the couch.

“I’m sorry you had to see that,” Lucifer whispered. “It’s not very often I lose my $%^&, but Van Halen is a trigger for me, and you have my deepest apologies.”

I still had the Snapple in my hand, so I held it out to him. This time he accepted my offering.

“That was some pretty awesome pitchfork work,” I told him like a geeky fan boy.

“It’s a great workout,” the Prince of Darkness informed me with a Devilish grin. “Because I exercise in that manner, this Devil never has to run.”

“I thought you were going to say you didn’t run because you can take any form you want, hence exercise wasn’t necessary,” I quipped.

“That’s part of it, too. Plus, they really don’t make running outfits that agree with my sense of style,” Satan shot back with a wink. “Now didn’t you say you wanted to tell me something funny?”

I growled. Not many people can say they’ve growled at The Devil and lived to tell the tale.

2 Responses to Running With The Devil

Hahaha brilliant! And very good point – I possibly turn into the devil when I attempt to run (a sweaty, out of breath devil lying down in the street begging someone to come and shoot her, that is)… I’m not sure if that counts?